Questions involving "comparison" a huge confusion

[nrohatgi]

Officials at the Unites States Mint believe that the Sacagawea dollar coin will be used more as a substitue for four quaters rather than for the dollar bill because its weight, only 8.1gms, is far less than four quaters, which weigh 5.67 gms each.

a) same
b) more as a substitute for four quaters than the dollar bill because it weighs only 8.1gms, far lighter than
c) as a substitue for four quarters more than for the dollar bill because it weighs only 8.1 gms, far less than
d) as a substitue for four quarters more than the dollar bill because its weight of only 8.1gms is far lighter than it is for
e) as a substitute more for four qurters rather than for the dollar bill because its weight , only 8.1gms, is far less than it is for

correct answer is C.

My question is there a sequence whether "more" or "substitute" comes first.
Will the following be correct too?

a) more as a substitute for four quarters than for dollar bill because it weighs only 8.1 gms, far less than

Similarly look at this question from GMAT verbal Study guide:
Contrary to popular opinion, the war on terrorism is leading neither to better times for investing, more of a relaxed sense of national security.
Will the following 2 are correct:
a) leading neither to better times for investion nor to more relaxed sense of national security.
b) neither leading to better times for investion nor to more relaxed sense of national security.

If you look at (b) above do we still say that neither X nor Y are parallel even though it is neither leading X nor Y.

Similarly:
When the temperature of a gas is increased, it is either accompanied by an increase in pressure if the gas is enclosed in a container, or an increase in volume if the gas is able to expand.

a) same
b) When the temperature of a gas is increased, it is accompanied either by an increase in pressure if it is enclosed in a container or
c) .....
d) Any increase in the temperature of a gas is either accompanied by an increase in pressure if it is enclosed in a container, or by
e) Any increase in the temperature of a gas is accompanied either by an increase in pressure if the gas is enclosed in a container or by

e is correct.

Now in this example:
b) is wrong because it did not end in "by"
d) is wrong because of ","
Again my question is does it matter if the sequence is "accompanied either" Or "either accompanied"

Thanks.[/u]

[RonPurewal]

Officials at the Unites States Mint believe that the Sacagawea dollar coin will be used more as a substitue for four quaters rather than for the dollar bill because its weight, only 8.1gms, is far less than four quaters, which weigh 5.67 gms each.

a) same
b) more as a substitute for four quaters than the dollar bill because it weighs only 8.1gms, far lighter than
c) as a substitue for four quarters more than for the dollar bill because it weighs only 8.1 gms, far less than
d) as a substitue for four quarters more than the dollar bill because its weight of only 8.1gms is far lighter than it is for
e) as a substitute more for four qurters rather than for the dollar bill because its weight , only 8.1gms, is far less than it is for

correct answer is C.

My question is there a sequence whether "more" or "substitute" comes first.
Will the following be correct too?

Depends on what you're trying to say.
X will be used more as a substitute for Y than Z = ambiguous: could mean either (1) X will be used as a substitute for Y, more than Z will be used as a substitute for Y, or (2) X will be used as a substitute for Y, more than X will be used as a substitute for Z.
You can clear up the ambiguity by adding little words in the right places: if you mean (1), then you'd add '...than will Z', and if you mean (2), then you'd add '...than for Z'.
There's the same problem of ambiguity even if the sequence is written the other way - you'd still want to use extra little words to clear it up (as is done in the correct answer choice here).

Similarly look at this question from GMAT verbal Study guide:
Contrary to popular opinion, the war on terrorism is leading neither to better times for investing, more of a relaxed sense of national security.
Will the following 2 are correct:
a) leading neither to better times for investion nor to more relaxed sense of national security.
b) neither leading to better times for investion nor to more relaxed sense of national security.

If you look at (b) above do we still say that neither X nor Y are parallel even though it is neither leading X nor Y.

Nope, only A is parallel. The neither...nor construction requires IDENTICAL structures for the two parts. So if the first part is 'TO something,' then the second has to be 'TO something else' (or PREPOSITION something else: you could have something like 'I transferred money neither to this account nor from it.')

Similarly:
When the temperature of a gas is increased, it is either accompanied by an increase in pressure if the gas is enclosed in a container, or an increase in volume if the gas is able to expand.

a) same
b) When the temperature of a gas is increased, it is accompanied either by an increase in pressure if it is enclosed in a container or
c) .....
d) Any increase in the temperature of a gas is either accompanied by an increase in pressure if it is enclosed in a container, or by
e) Any increase in the temperature of a gas is accompanied either by an increase in pressure if the gas is enclosed in a container or by

e is correct.

Now in this example:
b) is wrong because it did not end in "by"
d) is wrong because of ","
Again my question is does it matter if the sequence is "accompanied either" Or "either accompanied"

Thanks.[/u]

It definitely matters; from the content of your posts, it seems you've got a pretty good grasp of this idea already. Again, either/or constructions require identical forms for both parts.

[Guest]

Ron:

Just a couple of more questions on comparisons.

1) Looking at the examples in this post -
- X used more as a substitute for Y than for Z. 'A substitute' in the second part of the comparison is implied.
- X is neither leading to Y nor to Z. So 'leading' is not implied in the second part because Y and Z have to be
exactly identical.

Are there any other constructions like 'Either X or Y' and 'Neither X nor Y' where X and Y should be identical ?


thanks.

[StaceyKoprince]

more as a substitute // for Y than for Z
the // indicates where the parallelism starts - everything before the // applies to each piece in the parallel part ("for Y" and "for Z")

X is // neither leading to Y nor to Z
here, only "X is" applies to both b/c the idiom here is actually "neither A nor B" So "leading to Y" = A and "to Z" = B.

There are a ton of constructions that use this - do you have our Sentence Correction guide? There's a list of the most commonly used idioms in the Idioms chapter.

[H]

Hi,

S+V+O, more/less than X...

Couple questions:
- I just wonder what "more/less than.." is. An adverbial phrase that modifies the verb/action in the preceding clause?
- In this kind of structure, is it true that X is unambiguously compared with the subject S of the preceding clause regardless whether the verb(e.g. is/are/was/were/does/do/did/etc) after X is omitted? Hence, "does" isn't required to be placed after "four quarters"?
- What does the last "more than" phrase modify? drain? holds? or what?

More than 300 rivers drain into Siberia's Lake Baikal, which holds 20 percent of the world's fresh water, more than all the North American Great Lakes combined. <= from GMATPrep

[esledge]

More than 300 rivers drain into Siberia's Lake Baikal, which holds 20 percent of the world's fresh water, more than all the North American Great Lakes combined.

In this one, "more than all the North American Great Lakes combined" modifies "drain," the main verb of the sentence. It does not modify "holds" because that is part of another modifier. For modifiers with "which," do two things. First, make sure they actually should modify the noun right before them. That's fine here: Lake Baikal is what holds 20% of the world's fresh water. Second, you can ignore the "which" phrase to evaluate the sentence around it: "X rivers drain into Lake Baikal, more than all the North American Great Lakes combined."

In the "S+V+O, more than/less than used as a modifier" examples you cite, you can't have a verb in a tense within the modifying phrase. But it is NOT always true that you never need to repeat a verb in the second half of a more than/less than comparison. You just need to do so when the meaning could be interpreted two ways. Let's look at examples without commas, just to simplify:

"Joe likes chocolate more than vanilla" is clear as is, although it wouldn't be wrong to say "Joe likes chocolate more than he likes vanilla."

"Larry likes Yvette more than Francine" is NOT clear, as it could mean two different things. Either meaning would be clarified by the addition of a verb:
"Larry likes Yvette more than Francine does."
"Larry likes Yvette more than he likes Francine."

Whether you need two verbs really depends on the specific set of subjects, objects and verbs.

[H]

Thanks a lot!
Really appreciate!

[hberens18]

the // indicates where the parallelism starts - everything before the // applies to each piece in the parallel part ("for Y" and "for Z")

If this is the correct structure, it really does sound strange.

More as a subsitute [for Y] than [for Z] could be simplified to:
More as a subsitute [A] than [B], which doesn't seem to make grammatical sense.

Doesn't this work better?
More as a subsitute FOR [A] than [B], as illustrated in option D?

[RonPurewal]

More as a subsitute [for Y] than [for Z] could be simplified to:
More as a subsitute [A] than [B], which doesn't seem to make grammatical sense.

no it can't. if you think this, that's a BIG BIG problem.

your claim is tantamount to saying that you can just eliminate the word "for" whenever you see it. you can't "cancel out" terms that appear in parallel structures!
what is your justification for thinking this?

whatever it is, you should rid yourself of it, and quickly, since LOTS of parallel structures have repeated words.

go to this thread for some more examples of simple parallel structures, many of which contain repeated words:
post25465.html#p25465

[thanghnvn]

Whenever you see

not only... but also...
more... than...
not...but...

then,make sure that the words after the elements of those couples are in the same form and the similar content.

the words after "more" and "than" must be the same. This is a hard and fast rule. On the test day, we have no time to think of ambiguity.

[RonPurewal]

the words after "more" and "than" must be the same. This is a hard and fast rule.

well, not really.

in the case of "more ADJ/ADV than..." -- which is by far the most common context in which the more... than pair appears -- this "rule" will fail.
for instance, i can solve math problems more quickly than my brother is a correct sentence -- it's a basic comparison between me and my brother -- but this "rule" will wrongly conclude that it is incorrect.

as usual, attempts to substitute "hard and fast rules" for THINKING are going to fail. you have to establish the overall context of a sentence, including which elements are actually supposed to be parallel, before you can start thinking about stuff like this.

[thanghnvn]

Thank you Ron. pls confirm my following thinking.

b) more as a substitute for four quaters than the dollar bill because it weighs only 8.1gms, far lighter than
c) as a substitue for four quarters more than for the dollar bill because it weighs only 8.1 gms, far less than

B has no parallel error. B has the only error of "lighter than" . Why "lighter than" is wrong in B? pls, help.

[RonPurewal]

B has no parallel error.

yes, in fact it does have one:
post65294.html?sid=eb67a759861a033e5370b6785588099b#p65294

[eggpain24]

Officials at the Unites States Mint believe that the Sacagawea dollar coin will be used more as a substitue for four quaters rather than for the dollar bill because its weight, only 8.1gms, is far less than four quaters, which weigh 5.67 gms each.

a) same
b) more as a substitute for four quaters than the dollar bill because it weighs only 8.1gms, far lighter than
c) as a substitue for four quarters more than for the dollar bill because it weighs only 8.1 gms, far less than
d) as a substitue for four quarters more than the dollar bill because its weight of only 8.1gms is far lighter than it is for
e) as a substitute more for four qurters rather than for the dollar bill because its weight , only 8.1gms, is far less than it is for

correct answer is C.

My question is there a sequence whether "more" or "substitute" comes first.
Will the following be correct too?

a) more as a substitute for four quarters than for dollar bill because it weighs only 8.1 gms, far less than

Similarly look at this question from GMAT verbal Study guide:
Contrary to popular opinion, the war on terrorism is leading neither to better times for investing, more of a relaxed sense of national security.
Will the following 2 are correct:
a) leading neither to better times for investion nor to more relaxed sense of national security.
b) neither leading to better times for investion nor to more relaxed sense of national security.

If you look at (b) above do we still say that neither X nor Y are parallel even though it is neither leading X nor Y.

Similarly:
When the temperature of a gas is increased, it is either accompanied by an increase in pressure if the gas is enclosed in a container, or an increase in volume if the gas is able to expand.

a) same
b) When the temperature of a gas is increased, it is accompanied either by an increase in pressure if it is enclosed in a container or
c) .....
d) Any increase in the temperature of a gas is either accompanied by an increase in pressure if it is enclosed in a container, or by
e) Any increase in the temperature of a gas is accompanied either by an increase in pressure if the gas is enclosed in a container or by

e is correct.

Now in this example:
b) is wrong because it did not end in "by"
d) is wrong because of ","
Again my question is does it matter if the sequence is "accompanied either" Or "either accompanied"

Thanks.[/u]

sorry for bumping this thread
I just want to ask in the first question

Is there an effective split between “less” and “lighter”

[RonPurewal]

Yes.

You can't properly say that a weight is lighter than another weight.

A weight is a number. Weights don't weigh anything!
• A weight can be greater or less than another weight.
• An object/person/animal can be heavier or lighter than another object/person/animal.

Same issue here:
post44894.html#p44894

Remember, you don't always need to be thinking about these issues. You only need to think about them if they actually form the basis of a split between answer choices.